Students join work party for Solar Spring Break

HAYNE PALMOUR IV

PAUMA VALLEY, March 15, 2017 | North Carolina University student Tatyana McAllister-Sanders, left, and Grid Alternative team leader Mohamed Hauter connect wires to solar panels on a home at the La Jolla Indian Reservation, through the Solar Spring Break program.

PAUMA VALLEY, March 15, 2017 | North Carolina University student Tatyana McAllister-Sanders, left, and Grid Alternative team leader Mohamed Hauter connect wires to solar panels on a home at the La Jolla Indian Reservation, through the Solar Spring Break program. (HAYNE PALMOUR IV)

For her spring break, Tatyana McAllister spent the last week on a sunny rooftop, with a screw driver in hand.

McAllister, a student at North Carolina Central University, joined 18 classmates installing solar panels for a family on the La Jolla band of Luiseno Indians Reservation, near Palomar Mountain in northern San Diego County.

The students participated in the “Solar Spring Break” program through the nonprofit GRID Alternatives, which offers free solar arrays for low-income families, while providing work experience to student volunteers. Another 25 students from the University of Michigan and Arizona State University contributed in previous weeks, installing panels at the nearby San Pasqual Band of Mission Indians Reservation.

“Instead of going to party somewhere, they’re spending their spring break out here,” said Paul Cleary, executive director for the organization.

Much like the popular charity “Habitat for Humanity,” GRID deploys volunteer labor to construct infrastructure projects for families in need. The San Diego effort was part of a national campaign involving 100 students from 15 colleges and universities, aimed at curbing climate emissions and helping cut electric bills through solar power.

GRID obtained a half million dollar Department of Energy grant for the solar installations, and matched that with another half million of its own money and tribal funds, Cleary said. That will pay for the equipment and administration costs to place solar panels on 40 homes in the area, as well as several tribal buildings. The students provide the labor, gaining on the job training in electrical work and solar energy.

“It’s really fun,” said McAllister, 18, describing the technical skills she learned as she mounted the panels, stripped the wires, and connected them to the home’s electrical system. “I learned a lot. I didn’t know anything about electricity. It feels good. It’s very rewarding.”

A number of the North Carolina students are majors in biology and environmental science. For them, the solar project was a practical example of class topics such as sustainability and energy conservation. It’s also in line with what the historically black university describes as a tradition of preparing students “to become global leaders and practitioners who transform communities.”

That’s what Alvon Bailey, 26, had in mind for his spring break project. Bailey, who is researching sustainability and watershed protection for his master’s degree in Earth Science, said he wanted to visit California to learn about practices that are still in early stages in his home state. While Californians have made a habit of sorting recyclables, saving water and leveraging solar rebates to cut power costs, he said those practices haven’t been widely adopted back home.

“My family thinks it’s crazy that I have a recycling bin in my apartment,” he said. “We don’t have the same policies.”

Bailey grew up in hog and tobacco country in the southeast part of North Carolina, and is interested in working on watershed protection and conservation in that area, perhaps modifying abandoned mills to generate clean hydropower. He hopes to pursue a doctorate after obtaining his master’s degree, he said, and wants to work out West to learn about sustainability efforts. With that experience under his belt, he said, he could eventually introduce similar programs in his home state. The Solar Spring Break reaffirmed that plan.

“I already knew I wanted to do that, but this gave me that last little push,” he said.

The students also learned about local culture, sampling what they described as “Native American lasagna” — enchiladas — and enjoying native bird singers and traditional Luiseno games. That cultural connection was important for Katherine Gates, 22, an environmental and geographical science major, who said she appreciated the environmentally friendly traditions of Native American communities.

“They are more connected to the Earth,” she said. “So this correlates to their values, as well as helps financially.”

For students as well as the families they helped, the projects make a small but tangible difference in the effort to slow climate change, said Seth Cauman, the volunteer and collegiate coordinator for GRID Alternatives.

“It’s a way for people to really engage in climate solutions in a concrete and visible way,” he said.

PAUMA VALLEY, March 15, 2017 | North Carolina University student Katherine Gates, right, pulls wires through conduit as she and fellow students Sidney Joyner and Raven Balthrop work on the installation of solar panels on the roof of a low income home on the Reservation.

PAUMA VALLEY, March 15, 2017 | North Carolina University student Katherine Gates, right, pulls wires through conduit as she and fellow students Sidney Joyner and Raven Balthrop work on the installation of solar panels on the roof of a low income home on the Reservation. (HAYNE PALMOUR IV/SAN DIEGO UNION-TRIBUNE)